Effectiveness of Cooperative Learning by Jigsaw Method in Understanding Biochemistry for First Year MBBS StudentsA Randomised Interventional Study

Abstract

Introduction: Cooperative learning is a method of education in which the learner is responsible not only for his learning but also for the learning of others. One of the methods in cooperative learning is Jigsaw. Given the benefits of cooperative learning, the current researchers were interested to conduct teachinglearning sessions using the jigsaw method to teach "Enzymes" in Biochemistry. Aim: To estimate the effectiveness of Cooperative learning by the jigsaw method in understanding Biochemistry for 1st year Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) students. Materials and Methods: This randomised interventional study was conducted at East Point College of Medical Sciences and Research Centre, Bangalore, India from March 2021 to August 2021. The 150 first Year MBBS students for academic year 2020- 2021 were divided into two groups (control and interventional groups). Both control and intervention groups were subjected to pretest before learning sessions. In the intervention method, the students were divided into nine home groups with eight students each. Eight subtopics from enzymes were given for self study and to discuss with other members The control group had a learning session by traditional method. Following the learning sessions, both groups took post-test and their feedback was taken on the likert scale. The mean and standard deviation of pre and posttests were subjected to paired samples test and independent samples test. All the data obtained was entered into MS excel and analysed by Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20.0 using descriptive statistics. Paired student “t” test and independent test were used. Results: Interventional group had 72 students (26 male and 46 female students) and the control group had 75 (26 male and 49 female students). Students aged between 17 to 19 years participated in the study. The mean score in pretest was 15.70±3.04 and in post-test 21.02±2.31 for the interventional group, whereas it was 15.34±4.03 and 20.78±3.22 for pre and post-test respectively in the control group. This intragroup comparison was found to be significant (p0.05). Conclusion: Grades between pre and post-tests of both groups implied that tutorial sessions by jigsaw method helped to improve knowledge gain. Students felt the session helped to improve their communication skills and requested to implement other topics which is the need of the hour.

Keywords

• : enzymes
• self directed learning
• teaching-learning methods